UFO's Spotted Over Iranian Nuclear Facilities

Flying object fever has gripped Iran after dozens of reported sightings in the summer and in recent weeks. State-run media has reported sightings of unknown objects flying over parts of Iran where nuclear facilities are located. "The unidentified flying objects could be satellites, comets or spying or reconnaissance crafts trying to monitor Iran's nuclear installations," Mahini said. "Flights of unknown objects in the country's airspace have increased in recent weeks ... (they) have been seen over Bushehr and Isfahan provinces," the daily Resalat reported today. There are nuclear facilities in both provinces. The timing of the reported increase in sightings, which comes as the United States is urging allies to confront Iran over its nuclear program, has strengthened Iranian public perceptions that the objects are surveillance or hostile aircrafts monitoring Iran. Iran's Air Force chief Gen. Karim Ghavami was quoted in Iranian newspapers Saturday as saying that Iran was fully prepared to defend any threat to its nuclear installations.

Xmas

While everyone is aware that bacteria can cause disease, it’s less obvious that these microorganisms play an important part in the global ecosystem. “Having the genome of S. pomeroyi completely sequenced provides an invaluable tool to understand how an ocean bacterium functions and how it affects the Earth’s atmosphere,” says Moran. The knowledge gained from continued study of S. pomeroyi and its genome will be used in the study of related organisms that likewise mediate carbon and sulfur cycling in the ocean. Moran continued, “Admittedly, this is not the only bacterium that influences gas exchange between the ocean and atmosphere, but once we understand how S. pomeroyi functions, we can apply the knowledge to other related marine bacteria.”

Toward an Anti-Authoritarian Islam

The following is an excerpt from an essay recently posted on Infoshop News written by an Islamic anarchist named Salim:

Branding is everywhere in our society and all segments of society engage in it because of the sociology and pathology of our modern society even Anarcho-Punks are just another brand within our communities. The Anarcho-Punks, of which I am sometimes a member of, engage in the producer-consumer mentality. You have to have the right kind of packaging to belong, the right clothes, the right behavior (usually swearing and drinking 40ozers and knowledge of riding trains, hitch-hiking, petty crimes and squatting). And if you do not conform to this then you will be ostracized usually under a pretext of a being a “manarchist” a “infiltrator”, a “reformist”. Everyone in this society is being socially engineered to act in a competitive and destructive manner, checking out from the dominant brand does not change this behavior.

The means of fighting the sociology, this social engineering of individuals into producer-consumers is not political; every political ideology from religious fundamentalist to communist (did you buy your Che shirt for $15?) can be co-opted and turned into another brand. The means of fighting this socio-pathology is fundamentally a spiritual path—which is distinct from a religious ideology or organized institutional religion. It is not based on a materialism or socio-scientific praxis, it is based on seeking values and expressions which at their source are as non-material as the earliest shaman traditions which eventually transformed into prophetic traditions. It is based on transcendental praxis and motivations that which goes beyond the individual or what is within the individual. I am not saying that we should all be blindly obedient (taqlid) to prophets [6] and shaman, we need a thoughtful and disciplined, even scientific understanding of religious or shamanistic psychology, but the core values of naturalism are embodied in the spiritual psyche not the sociology of the producer-consumer. Some of these values are communal consultation (shura), stewardship of the Creator’s creation (istikhlaf), equality (`adl), non-aggression (salam), mutually beneficial economics [7] (mudarabat), sharing and giving (sadaqa wa zakat).

Now I know you're thinking, "Gasp! The Horror! Someone who dares to pollute our infallible anarchist ideology with religion!" However I feel that this article is one of the most interesting it pieces of writing I've seen produced by recent anti-authoritarian thinkers. I'm particularly impressed by the emphasis on flexibility and the critique of dogmatic belief systems conveyed by the author. Just imagine the geopolitical consequences of a widespread and powerful anti-authoritarian, ecologically conscious, and anti-capitalist current emerging within the Islamic world.
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Wednesday, December 15, 2004

School distributes satanic sex calendar

Local school officials in a suburb of Houston, Texas, are investigating how it was possible that a school police officer handed out calendars to students that featured explicit details on satanic and sexual rituals for every day of the month.

Parents in Pearland are demanding answers, according to a news report on KHOU-TV.

The school police officer who handed out the calendars was supposed to deliver a positive anti-gang message to the students last Monday, according to the report.

"September 20th is a 'midnight host' whatever that is," said one unidentified parent reading from the calendar. "You should have a blood-type ritual. September 23rd is the fall equinox – you should have an orgy. Activity group sex, any age, any sex."

I've had this on the links bar for a while now but I just wanted to call attention to it. This is the website of the pFARM people. For those of you that don't already know, pFARM is an intentional community in Woodstock, New York that combines saso-masochistic fetish practices, biotechnology, and organic farming. Im other words, these people are my heros. Lots of pictures are available on the site.
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